For a while, it seemed as though public sentiment in media and the news was shifting toward acceptance and a change in the way we perceive people…fashion modeling became open to those who more closely resembled “real” people; the media was getting pressure to make changes in the types of people they portray in advertisements and in print to better reflect reality as well, the feeling of hope that settled into the states at the election of their first black president seemed to fill the world with hope. But just as the American President’s approval rating has started to decline, largely over matters only Congress can affect, so has the level of tolerance, and it’s not just America that feels the effect, but everyone who has access to American TV programming.
How does this affect teenagers? To begin with, when our tolerance levels are low as a community or a nation, we start judging people by their appearances, and it makes it much more difficult to raise tolerant teens. If you look like you come from the Middle East, you must be Arabic, a member of a jihad, and about to blow up someone or something. If you are fat, you must be lazy, unintelligent, and spend most of your time thinking about food. If you look Latin American and live in the Southwestern U.S. or California, you must be an illegal alien.
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